I like fantasies as much as anyone else, but when I walk into a house I think it should be real. You know, it should actually have walls and such. That’s not what I found when I arrived at a newly renovated AirBnB bungalow. I spent hours searching the listings to find the perfect place.

The accommodation looked quaint, and even had its own garage for secure parking, which was a real selling point for the location. Instead, what I found when I arrived reminds me a lot of what’s wrong with most medical website designs. When I pulled up, everything looked as it should: the building matched the photos and the garage looked normal…from the outside. This is what it looked like when I drove my rental car to the garage.

There was nothing in the garage, it was a facade without substance. It was like walking up to a Ferrari and opening the hood to find no engine. What a disappointment! Garages are more than just a parking space; They serve one function: to keep your car safe. However, not only was this garage not locked, but there were loose boards hanging from the ceiling and construction materials lying everywhere.

What does this have to do with website design? Take a look at your website data. Your website can be absolutely beautiful with a sleek design, but if it doesn’t bring you business, it’s completely worthless, just fluff with no substance. Worse still, if you don’t fulfill three basic functions, you may be losing patients.

Websites are more than just pretty design

Your website design should be more than just a pretty picture. Each element should be designed to be compelling and persuasive and lead to the action you want patients to take. You need to focus on your patient’s needs, and more importantly, you need to increase business. Ask yourself, how many new patients has my website generated this month?

If your website doesn’t generate ten to fifteen new patients a month, it’s just a shell. Nice, perhaps, on the outside, but useless for recruiting new patients or generating phone calls and appointments. A great medical website design should grab the patient’s attention, start building trust and encourage them to meet you in person. We have over 10 years of experience designing, testing, and building medical websites that do just these things, and this is what we’ve found.

Research Reveals: It’s All About Trust

One of the key findings from a recent Yext report was that more than 3-quarters of patients look to individual providers when looking for a doctor. They do not look for hospitals or health centers; They want to know the individual doctor they will be dealing with and they want to know that they can trust this person with their health and well-being. Our medical websites go beyond listing staff and specialties. Our web designs focus on the main concerns of patients: which doctor will I see and can I trust them with my health?

What could that mean for your practice? “Our first quarter 2018 gross receipts were up 500% compared to the prior year,” says Lori Klein Gardner, Au.D., of Hear Virginia. “Our first quarter net income has tripled, our new appointments have nearly doubled per month.” That is the power of a customer-centric website. Launch a radically more effective website in just a few weeks.

Build your credibility

In a Weatherby Healthcare report, patients ranked a doctor’s knowledge and skills above all else when deciding which doctor to see. But the way they determine knowledge is often based on reviews and other online sources. More than half of patients research doctors before making an appointment, and three out of four patients find reviews important before deciding which doctor to see. In fact, checkups were just as important to patients as the location of the office.

This trend follows basic consumer behavior: 91% of consumers read reviews before buying something, and 84% of them will trust reviews as much as they would a friend’s advice. Many practices know that reviews are important, but struggle to get a consistent influx of good reviews. Proofreading tools can not only simplify this process, but also lead to much better results.

Instead of trying to get patients to submit reviews directly to your site, review software like Online Review Builder™ engages patients where they prefer to leave reviews: on social media. The Online Review Generator then funnels those reviews back to the practice site where new patients are likely to see them. “Our practice has grown 21% in the last year and I attribute 99% of our growth to our Online Review Builder™ and our 46 positive reviews on Google.” says Gena Marino, Fairfax Hearing Center, VA.

Turn interest into a date

Once you’ve attracted patients and built trust and credibility, your website design should encourage them to make an appointment. This last crucial step is actually a science in itself. Increasing conversions on a site requires a clear hierarchy of information and customer paths that lead to strong calls to action.

At the end of the day, what you want customers to do is call to make an appointment. “We’re getting 5x more leads from the web, worth $20,000 a month to our practice,” says Sean Pendel, Audiology Associates and Hearing Aids Today of Nashville, TN. Does your website do that? Audit your website today.